Non-resident landlord accountant
Whether your agent is deducting 20% from your rent or you have UK returns outstanding, a free consultation shows you whether you can be paid gross and what it costs to put right, from wherever you are.
The scheme
How the non-resident landlord scheme catches you
Moving abroad does not move your rental income out of UK tax. UK property income is taxed here whoever owns it and wherever they live. What changes when you leave is how the tax gets collected. Once your usual place of abode is outside the UK, the non-resident landlord scheme requires your UK letting agent to deduct basic rate tax at 20% from your rent before paying you across, and to send that money to HMRC quarterly. Where there is no UK agent, the obligation lands on any tenant paying you more than £100 a week.
The test is not the statutory residence test. It is a usual place of abode test, and HMRC treats an absence from the UK of six months or more as meeting it. You can be UK resident for income tax purposes and still be a non-resident landlord for this scheme, which is exactly the trap that catches people on fixed-term overseas postings.
Deductions are not the end of it. The agent works out the 20% on rent less the expenses they happen to know about, which typically means their own fees and repairs they arranged. Mortgage interest, insurance, ground rent, accountancy and anything you paid directly do not feature. Landlords with borrowing therefore have far too much taken and only get it back through a UK return. For the mechanics of what the agent does and when, see our guides to the 20% withholding calculation and the agent quarterly return cycle.
The fix is approval to receive rent gross. It does not reduce the tax due. It stops the cash being taken a year early from a figure that was never right in the first place. Our full guide to the scheme sets out the statutory framework, and the NRL1 application walkthrough covers the form itself.
Your tenant pays the rent
UK property income is taxed here whoever owns it and wherever they live.
20% is taken before you see it
Your UK letting agent deducts basic rate tax from the rent. With no UK agent, the duty falls on any tenant paying you more than £100 a week.
It goes to HMRC quarterly
Set against the bill you will eventually settle on your UK tax return.
But the 20% is not worked out on your profit
The agent nets off only the costs that passed through their hands. Everything else is invisible to them.
So a landlord with borrowing has far too much taken, and only gets it back through a UK return.
Deducted before the 20%
- The agent's own fees
- Repairs the agent arranged
Not deducted
- Mortgage interest
- Insurance
- Ground rent
- Accountancy fees
- Anything you paid directly
The fix: approval to receive your rent gross
It does not reduce the tax you owe. It stops the cash being taken a year early, from a figure that was never right in the first place.
Note: Example figures displayed
Our clients
Who we work with
Six situations account for most of the people who come to us. None of them is unusual, and every one of them is cheaper to sort out early than to unpick after the fact.
If one of these sounds like your own position, it is worth a conversation now rather than at the next deadline.
Book a consultationThe service
What the service covers
If you are UK resident and letting UK property, the standard landlord accounting service is the right starting point instead, and our landlord tax overview explains the rules that apply to everyone regardless of where they live.
NRL scheme registration and gross payment approval
We prepare and submit your application to receive rent without the 20% deduction: NRL1 if you own personally, NRL2 for a non-resident company, NRL3 for trustees. We deal with HMRC on the queries that follow, and we make sure your agent is told once approval lands so the deductions actually stop.
UK Self Assessment while you live abroad
Your UK rental profit stays within UK tax whatever your residence status. We prepare the return, claim the tax already deducted at source, handle the residence pages, and check whether the disregarded income rules or your personal allowance entitlement leave you better off. Filing deadline is 31 January after the tax year ends, with payments on account by 31 January and 31 July where the previous year's liability was over £1,000.
Recovering over-deducted tax
Agents deduct 20% from rent after allowable expenses they know about, which usually ignores mortgage interest, insurance, letting fees you paid directly and repairs. Most non-resident landlords with a mortgage are owed money back. We reconcile the NRL6 certificates against the real accounts and reclaim the difference.
Double tax treaty positions
The UK taxes UK rental profit first because the property sits here. Your country of residence usually taxes the same income again and gives credit for the UK tax. We work out the credit position, the timing mismatch between tax years, and whether a treaty article changes anything on interest, dividends or gains flowing between the two countries.
Capital gains and 60-day reporting
Non-residents pay UK CGT on disposals of UK land, and on indirect disposals of shares in property-rich entities. A return is due within 60 days of completion on every disposal, including no-gain and loss disposals, and the payment is due on the same date. We handle the rebasing choice, the computation and the filing.
Company and structure questions
Non-UK-resident companies holding UK property have paid corporation tax rather than income tax on their rental profit since April 2020, which brings the loan relationship and corporate interest restriction rules with it. If you hold through an offshore company, we cover the filings and tell you plainly whether the structure still earns its cost.
Testimonials
What landlords say
Anonymised feedback from landlords and investors, including those letting UK property from overseas.
“They modelled our Section 24 position properly for the first time and showed us exactly where incorporation did and did not make sense. No hard sell, just the numbers.”
“We were weeks from missing the 60-day capital gains deadline on a sale. They turned the computation around and filed on time. Worth the fee on that alone.”
“Getting ready for Making Tax Digital felt overwhelming. They set up the software, mapped every property, and now the quarterly filing just happens.”
Filing
Self Assessment when you live overseas
Your UK return still runs on UK dates. Online filing and payment are due by 31 January following the end of the tax year, with payments on account on 31 January and 31 July where the previous year's liability was more than £1,000. Being nine time zones away does not extend anything, and HMRC will not accept a foreign filing season as a reasonable excuse.
Two points decide most non-resident returns. The first is whether you get the UK personal allowance. UK and Irish nationals, nationals of EEA states and residents of certain treaty countries generally do. Everyone else is taxed from the first pound of profit. The second is the disregarded income election, which can let you exclude some UK investment income from the calculation at the cost of the allowance. Which is better depends on the mix of your UK income, and it is worth recomputing each year rather than assuming last year's answer holds. The filing requirements guide works through both.
Mortgage interest relief is the other item that bites. Since Section 24 finished phasing in, interest is not deductible from rental profit at all. It gives a basic rate tax reduction instead, currently 20% and rising to 22% from April 2027, when property income itself is taxed at 22%, 42% and 47%. Where you have no personal allowance and a geared portfolio, the effective rate on your UK rent can be higher than a landlord at home would pay on the same property. Our Section 24 calculator shows the size of the effect on your figures.
Making Tax Digital arrives on the same timetable for you as for everyone else: qualifying income over £50,000 from April 2026, over £30,000 from April 2027 and over £20,000 from April 2028, with quarterly updates in compatible software on top of the year-end return. Living abroad is not an exemption and neither is using an agent. Check your date with the MTD checker.
Every year, UK dates
File and pay
Online filing and payment for the tax year that ended the previous 5 April, plus the first payment on account.
Second payment on account
Due where the previous year's liability was more than £1,000.
Already in the diary
- April2026
Making Tax Digital at £50,000
Quarterly updates in compatible software once qualifying income passes £50,000.
- April2027
MTD at £30,000, and new property rates
MTD extends to qualifying income over £30,000. Property income is taxed at 22%, 42% and 47%, and the finance cost reducer rises to 22%.
- April2028
MTD at £20,000
The last step of the ladder: quarterly updates once qualifying income passes £20,000.
Living abroad does not move any of these dates, and neither does using an agent. Note: Example figures displayed
Free tools
Size it yourself first
If the numbers turn out to be small, you may not need us at all, and we would rather you found that out for free.
Got a figure you were not expecting?
Book a consultationTreaties
Double tax treaties: what they do and what they do not
The UK taxes the rent first
Nearly every UK double tax treaty gives the country where the land sits the first right to tax income from that land. The treaty then obliges your country of residence to relieve the double charge, normally by crediting the UK tax against its own.
The credit is capped at the local tax
Charge less than the UK and the credit is wasted, so the UK rate is what you effectively pay; charge more and you top up locally. Timing is the other friction, because the UK tax year ends on 5 April and almost nowhere else does.
A tie-breaker for the year you move
Treaties also carry a residence tie-breaker for years when you are arguably resident in both countries, which is the usual battleground in the year you move.
Our introduction to how tax treaties work covers the structure, and the tie-breaker test guide deals with dual residence. If you are heading somewhere specific, the country pathways for Dubai and Australia show how differently the same UK position plays out.
Disposals
Selling from abroad: the 60-day rule
Non-residents are within UK capital gains tax on disposals of UK residential and commercial land, and on indirect disposals of shares in entities deriving at least 75% of their value from UK land where you hold at least a 25% interest. Residential gains are charged at 18% and 24% depending on where the gain falls against the basic rate band, and the annual exempt amount is £3,000.
The reporting rule is stricter for you than for a UK resident. A UK property disposal return is due within 60 days of completion on every disposal of UK land, including ones producing a loss and ones fully covered by private residence relief, with the tax payable on the same date. A UK resident files only where capital gains tax is actually due. Late filing penalties apply to you even where no tax is due, and conveyancers routinely fail to mention it.
The computation itself usually turns on rebasing, and choosing the wrong basis is the expensive part rather than missing a relief. The charge reached non-residents disposing of UK residential property on 6 April 2015, and extended to non-residential UK land and to indirect disposals on 6 April 2019. So depending on what you are selling you may be able to use the market value at 5 April 2015 or 5 April 2019 instead of original cost, or elect for straight-line time apportionment, and the difference between the options can be large. See our guides to non-resident CGT rates and reporting and selling UK property from overseas.
From completion, not from the tax year end
A UK property disposal return is due within 60 days of completion on every disposal of UK land, and the tax is payable on the same date.
It applies even to a disposal producing a loss, and to one fully covered by private residence relief.
The charge on the gain
- 18%
- Residential gains within the basic rate band
- 24%
- Residential gains above it
- £3,000
- Annual exempt amount
Rebasing: three possible bases
- 1Market value at April 2015
- 2Market value at April 2019
- 3Straight-line time apportionment
Which are available depends on the type of property and when the regime started applying to it. The difference between them can be large.
Note: Example figures displayed
Completing in the next few months? The 60-day clock starts at completion.
Book a consultationBefore you go
Moving abroad with a UK portfolio
The twelve months either side of departure carry most of the planning value, and almost all of it expires once you have gone. Split-year treatment determines which side of the line your income and gains fall. The date you exchange on a sale can decide whether a disposal is taxed as a resident or a non-resident. Mortgage lenders treat expat borrowers differently, so refinancing before you go is often cheaper than refinancing after.
Register for the scheme before the first rent payment goes through rather than after, notify HMRC that you are leaving, and get the agent instructions in writing. Our pre-departure checklist sequences the whole thing, and expat landlord mortgages covers the finance side.
Inheritance tax deserves a look while you are at it. UK land is within the charge whoever owns it and wherever they live, and holding it through an offshore company no longer avoids that for residential property. Thresholds are frozen to 5 April 2031, so a portfolio that grows in value grows its exposure. Our note on non-resident inheritance tax exposure sets out the position, and if you own through a company, the corporation tax changes for non-resident companies explain what changed in April 2020.
- Split-year treatment, which decides the side of the line your income and gains fall on
- The exchange date on a sale, which can decide whether a disposal is taxed as a resident or a non-resident
- Refinancing, while lenders still price you as a UK borrower rather than an expat one
- Non-resident landlord scheme registration, before the first rent payment rather than after
- Telling HMRC you are leaving, and getting the agent instructions in writing
- Departs
- The day you leave
- Planning window
- 12 months either side
Still here? Almost all of this stops being available the day you leave.
Book a consultationCommon failure points
Where non-resident cases go wrong in general practice
- Most high street accountants see one or two non-resident landlords a year. The gross approval process, the NRL6 reconciliation and the disregarded income calculation are what they get wrong.
- The 60-day disposal return sits outside the normal Self Assessment cycle, which makes it the most missed deadline for overseas owners.
- Treaty credit only works if both filings are prepared with knowledge of the other. We work with your overseas adviser, not around them.
- Section 24 restricts mortgage interest relief to a basic rate reduction, 20% now and 22% from April 2027, when property income moves to rates of 22%, 42% and 47%. With no personal allowance, that interaction pushes effective rates higher than most people expect.
Getting started
How working with us runs
- 01
Position review
A short call covering where you live, what you own, who collects the rent, what has been filed and what has not. You leave that call knowing whether you are non-resident for these purposes and what is actually outstanding.
- 02
Registration and clean-up
Gross payment application, Self Assessment registration, agent instructions, and any back years brought up to date. Where tax has been over-deducted, we reclaim it in the same pass.
- 03
Annual cycle
Rental accounts, the return, the treaty credit position for your home country, quarterly updates once Making Tax Digital applies to you, and a reminder well before each deadline rather than the week of it.
- 04
Event work when it happens
Selling, refinancing, moving country again, buying another property, or inheriting one. These are the moments where the decision is worth more than the compliance, and they are covered by the same relationship.
Everything runs remotely. Documents go through a secure portal, calls happen at a time that works in your zone, and you never need to be in the UK for any of it. Fees depend on the number of properties, the number of back years and whether a company, trust or disposal is involved, so we quote once we have seen the position, and the figure is fixed before any work starts.
Everything on this page is covered in more depth across our non-resident landlord tax guides.
Free consultation
Get your non-resident landlord position sorted
Tell us where you are based and what you let in the UK. We will tell you whether you can be paid gross, what is outstanding, and what it will cost to put right.
- Non-resident specialistsNRL scheme, gross payment status and UK returns
- Fixed fees, quoted upfrontNo hourly billing, no surprise invoices
- 24-hour responseWherever you are, whatever the time zone
No obligation and no hard sell. Late or missing returns are a normal starting point, not a problem.
Book your free consultation
FAQ